Two-sided cooking (e.g., cooking with heat applied from griddle plate members both above and below the food product) generally reduces the overall cooking time and the amount of operator attention required for cooking the food products. Not only is cooking time dramatically reduced with two-sided cooking, but certain foods such as hamburgers, are improved in taste and texture by the application of force (e.g., a compressing of sandwiching type force) during the cooking process. Therefore, two-sided griddle-type cooking devices, also known as clam shell griddles, are highly desirable in fast food restaurants.
It would be desirable to provide an upper griddle mechanism adaptable to existing product lines and facilitating ease of operator use.